[The Taliban has said it would not allow al-Qaeda or other terrorist groups to launch attacks from the country. But outside observers say the Taliban maintains ties to al-Qaeda.]
“We went to Afghanistan almost 20 years ago with clear
goals: get those who attacked us on Sept. 11, 2001, and make sure al-Qaeda
could not use Afghanistan as a base from which to attack us again,” President
Biden said in remarks from the White House last week, defending the pullout of
American forces after the Afghan government’s swift collapse over the weekend.
“We did that.”
But some experts aren’t so sure. While al-Qaeda has been
substantially weakened since 2001 — and the Taliban has committed to preventing
it from attacking the United States and its allies — al-Qaeda fighters remain
in Afghanistan and have hailed its takeover.
The Taliban has said it would not allow al-Qaeda or other
terrorist groups to launch attacks from the country. But outside observers say
the Taliban maintains ties to al-Qaeda.
[Taliban
insists it will not shelter al-Qaeda in Afghanistan this time around]
The Islamic State, a more extreme rival, also retains a
presence in Afghanistan. The Taliban is likely to try to root it out, experts
said — but the Islamic State, too, could benefit from a security vacuum as the
Taliban tries to consolidate power.
Here’s where the Islamic State and al-Qaeda stand in
Afghanistan.
What is al-Qaeda’s relationship to the Taliban, and how
strong is the group?
The first time the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, from 1996 to
2001, it sheltered al-Qaeda militants who plotted the 9/11 attacks on the
United States. The U.S.-led coalition invaded Afghanistan in 2001 with the aim
of crushing the extremist group.
After two decades of conflict and counterterrorism
operations, “al-Qaeda in Afghanistan is a skeleton of its former self,” said
Fawaz Gerges, a professor at the London School of Economics. He said the group
lacks charismatic leadership and is “starved financially.”
A recent U.N. report said al-Qaeda maintained a presence in
at least 15 Afghan provinces. An offshoot, al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent,
has operated “under the Taliban umbrella” from Kandahar, Helmand and Nimruz
provinces, according to the United Nations. In total, al-Qaeda members are
estimated to number between several dozen to 500 people.
Mohammed Naeem, a Taliban spokesman, denied the presence of
al-Qaeda in Afghanistan in an interview with Saudi Arabia’s al-Hadath TV that
aired Sunday. He said the extremist group had no foothold in the country and no
relationship with the Taliban, though there may be “family ties” between
members of the two organizations.
But a recent U.N. report said al-Qaeda showed “no indication
of breaking ties” with the Taliban. Ideological alignment and personal
relationships, including intermarriage, have kept the groups close.
Afghanistan analyst Abdul Sayed characterized the
relationship as “cordial and stronger than in the pre-9/11 period.”
Though the Taliban has “begun to tighten its control” over
al-Qaeda, the U.N. said in the spring,
“it is impossible to assess with confidence that the Taliban will live up to
its commitment to suppress any future international threat emanating from
Al-Qaida in Afghanistan.”
[Nearly
20 years of war, 10 days to fall: Afghanistan, by the numbers]
What presence does the Islamic State have in Afghanistan?
The Islamic State in Khorasan began operating in Afghanistan
in 2015, according to a report by the Center for Strategic and International
Studies.
Started by Pakistani national Hafiz Zaeed Khan, who pledged
allegiance to the Islamic State’s former head Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2014, it
began as a small band of mostly Pakistani militants operating in the eastern
Afghanistan province of Nangahar. Some recruits came from the Taliban, though
members of other extremist groups in the region also defected to the Khorasan
group, according to the CSIS report.
Like its parent group — the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria
— the Afghanistan offshoot has ambitions to hold territory and is known for
carrying out brutal attacks on civilians. Shiites are particularly frequent
targets.
U.N. Secretary General António Guterres warned in 2019 that
after the Islamic State lost its territory in Iraq and Syria, its umbrella
group in Afghanistan had access to hundreds of millions of dollars to finance
terrorism.
The Islamic State in Khorasan has never successfully
captured territory in Afghanistan. Instead, its strategy has centered on
attacking civilian targets such as mosques, schools and weddings.
The number of attacks it has carried out annually has
decreased in recent years. During the first four months of this year, the U.N.
recorded 77 attacks associated with the group. The Islamic State claimed
responsibility for the bombing of a girls’ school in Kabul in May that killed
more than 85 people, mostly students.
U.S. airstrikes took out key leaders of the Islamic State in
Khorasan, including its founder, early on. And in 2017, the U.S. military
dropped the “mother
of all bombs” on a cave where fighters were hiding in Nangahar
province.
Still, the affiliate group has managed to sustain itself.
The U.N. estimates that it retains a core group of some 1,500 to 2,200 fighters
in Konar and Nangahar provinces. Smaller cells are scattered across the
country.
[Taliban
says it will be more tolerant toward women. Some fear otherwise.]
What threats do the Islamic State and al-Qaeda pose in
Afghanistan?
Most analysts agree that al-Qaeda lacks the strength and
capability to pose an immediate threat to the United States.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on “Fox News Sunday”
that al-Qaeda’s capacity to attack the United States or its allies is “vastly diminished,”
though he acknowledged that “remnants” of the group remained in Afghanistan.
But given the chance that al-Qaeda will acquire a sanctuary
under the Taliban — and the complications
to counterterrorism operations that the Taliban victory poses — some
say the group could later reconstitute itself.
U.S. intelligence officials had previously said that would
take up to two years. But Nathan Sales, who served as a senior counterterrorism
official during the Trump administration, said that after the Taliban’s
takeover, that period could be around six months.
Much depends on how much leeway the Taliban gives the group.
Al-Qaeda is “fully following the Taliban’s instructions for
supporting its strategies,” Sayed said, and supported the Taliban’s February
2020 deal with the United States for the withdrawal of U.S. and allied troops.
That agreement obligated
the Taliban to prevent al-Qaeda and other terrorists from using Afghanistan to
attack the United States or its allies. The Taliban reiterated this week that
it remains committed to that promise.
“The Taliban will be unlikely to allow al-Qaeda to operate
from Afghanistan and endanger the survival of their nascent rule as the
terrorist organization did in 2001,” Gerges said.
Michael Kugelman, deputy director of the Asia Program at the
Wilson Center, said the Islamic State offshoot in Afghanistan is “certainly
resilient and potent” but is unlikely to be able to plan attacks on faraway
targets.
Afghanistan’s neighbors, however, are concerned about
extremist activity. Russia has ramped up military exercises in Tajikistan,
which shares a long border with Afghanistan, for fear of radical Islamist
groups spilling over into its Central Asian ally.
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan on
Sunday voiced the administration’s concerns of a possible Islamic State attack.
“The threat is real. It is acute. It is persistent. And it
is something that we are very focused on with every tool in our arsenal,” he
said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Biden said on Friday that officials are keeping a close eye
on threats from the group, particularly after the Taliban released many
prisoners this month.
Unlike its attitude toward al-Qaeda, however, the Taliban
sees the Islamic State as an existential threat and has fought the group in
Afghanistan for years.
Some observers had worried that a peace agreement between
the Taliban and the Afghan government could drive more extreme members of the
Taliban to the Islamic State. After the Taliban’s military victory, that looks
less likely.
Kugelman said the Taliban has “compelling reasons” to target
the Islamic State, and could use newly acquired U.S.-made weapons to do so.
Such a move could help the Taliban bolster its image in the eyes of foreign
governments.
But as it begins to take up the levers of government, the
Taliban may be distracted by more pressing priorities, experts say — and the
Islamic State and other groups could take advantage of lapses in security. The
U.N. has estimated that there are already between 8,000 and 10,000 fighters
belonging to various militant groups in Afghanistan.
“The U.S. withdrawal is an increasingly galvanizing moment
for these jihadist forces in Afghanistan and the broader region,” Kugelman said
A desire to drive the United States out of the region has
long been a focus of propaganda for radical Islamist groups, and Kugelman said
the U.S. pullout may inspire militants from the surrounding region to plan
local attacks or move to Afghanistan.
There has already been excited chatter among sympathizers of
extremist groups in the area: An intelligence official from an Arab
nation told
The Washington Post that officials had seen an uptick in jihadist
communications about developments in Afghanistan, and the Taliban takeover “is
encouraging many jihadists to think about traveling to Afghanistan now instead
of Syria or Iraq.”
One al-Qaeda fighter, who goes by the name Abu Khaled,
hailed the Taliban’s victory as a turning point for extremist groups.
“God willing, the success of the Taliban will be also a
chance to unify mujahideen movements like al-Qaeda and Daesh,” he said, using
another name for the Islamic State.
Missy Ryan, Souad Mekhennet and Ellen Francis contributed
to this report, which has been updated.